Before you feel frustrated and think about getting off the weight loss bandwagon because you are not seeing drops on your scales or changes in BMI, really take note of these signs your body is showing that it is burning fat.
The authors of this study reported that doing an intense workout right before starting your fast helps your body go into fat-burning mode a lot quicker…three-and-a-half hours quicker, to be precise. According to a single review, ten weeks of resistance training may help boost resting calorie burning by 7 percent, and can decrease fat mass by four pounds (1.8 kilograms) ( 4 ). Resistance training also can help maintain lean mass, which may increase calories burned by the body at rest (3). Resistance training helps your body release excess fat by increasing post-exercise fat burning and increasing muscle size.
Adding more muscle through lifting weights and doing other resistance exercises also helps burn fat, particularly if you are dieting as well. Other studies have found that aerobic training increases lean muscle mass and reduces stomach fat, waist size, and body fat (38, 39, 40). Another study found that a 12-week power workout combined with aerobic exercise was more effective in reducing body fat and stomach fat compared to aerobic exercise alone (2).
If you are toning down while slimming, you may pack on lean tissue while burning fat, meaning that you are going to lower body fat levels without seeing big results on the scale. It goes without saying that in order to burn the fat stored in adipose tissue and to get lean, you have to create a caloric deficit and engage in exercises that force the body to tap into additional stored fat deposits for energy. If you maintain the caloric deficit, fat stored in your body continues to be used for energy, creating less body fat.
Because the body is constantly burning fat, we are getting an ongoing energy supply, with no need for sugar. When this happens, the body starts to store up its remaining body stores of sugar, goes to its fat cells, and starts burning fat for energy. When diabetics are running out of insulin for using glucose, their bodies begin burning fat (in the form of ketones) for energy.
Your body stores excess ingested energy in fat cells as triglycerides, which appears as the kind of fat found in your bloodstream. When you are maintaining a caloric deficit, you release the fat from the fat cells and carry it to energy-producing areas of your body called the mitochondria. When you are fasting, you are not providing calories to use as energy, so your body goes to its fat reserves and burns those fat reserves to generate energy. However, when fasting, we do not get any glucose through our foods, so ultimately, the body turns to other sources for fuel.
If there are not enough calories provided each day, the body begins burning stored fat for energy. When you have a diet that is heavy on fats and very light on carbohydrates, you naturally have to burn fat to get energy, and the body will remain in a fat-burning mode as long as you are not providing it enough carbohydrates. Eating less carbohydrates may help you become a better fat burner by allowing your body to burn fat for fuel in the first place.
Your body burns more calories when you eat protein than when digesting either fat or carbohydrates. For most people eating Western or Mediterranean-style diets, your body gets energy by burning sugar, which is typically from carbohydrates. All foods boost your metabolism, but you may be able to boost it more efficiently by including fat-burning foods in your diet.
When your body is fat-burning, it switches over to using fat as an alternate source of energy, instead of relying on food sources to fill up blood glucose, as a result, you will wake up feeling better, with lots of energy, and completely refreshed. When a shift occurs, and a persons body starts burning stored fat for energy, this is called entering ketosis. Researchers have theorized that exercising prior to a fast causes the body to burn a substantial amount of energy/glucose, eventually leading to a rapid conversion into ketosis. Research published in The Journal of Physiology found that exercising while in a fasted state (before grabbing that croissant) primes the body to more efficiently burn stored fat.
Once you are burning fat for energy, you quickly gain the benefits of sustained energy levels, real hunger feelings (12-24 hours apart), reduced body fat, and no longer being slave to hunger. You are in complete control, and when you make the transition to burning fat at its most optimal, not only your general health, but also athletic performance, can expect to improve. Not only will you drop the pounds, you will also have full energy throughout the day, and no more reaching for caffeine, nicotine, or sugar to power through your day.
The combination of having your body act like it is supposed to, while having a slight caloric deficit, could mean effortlessly losing fat, with no consistent hunger. You are burning calories just from maintaining healthy muscle tissue, so keeping muscle keeps your metabolism up; keeping muscle also means most of the fat loss you are seeing comes from fat. Muscle is metabolically active, so when you lose muscle, you are also losing any additional calories-burning muscle might have provided.
Enzymes do not discriminate among sources of fat, so increasing the ability of your body to process dietary fat makes it more efficient at burning body fat, too. Its job is to break down fatty acids into molecular compounds called ketones, and this is the preferred method of turning fats into easy-to-digest packets of energy for your body. People who train their bodies to rely on fats as a source of fuel–in other words, those who follow the keto diet–rely on fats as an abundant, energy-dense form of energy, as opposed to carbohydrates, which are less energy-dense fuel they must regularly replenish.
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